Richmond: Two-alarm industrial yard fire fueled by wooden pallets

RICHMOND -- A two-alarm fire at a storage yard for several businesses used hundreds of stacked wooden pallets for fuel and burned a large amount of equipment and machinery, officials said.

No one was injured.

The blaze was reported at 2:15 a.m. at 575 Brookside Drive, in an unincorporated industrial area. The yard is shared by five different businesses, according to Richmond Fire Battalion Chief Merlin Turner.

With flames consuming the pallets quickly and the back side of the yard bounded by a creek, the fire was difficult to access, Turner said.

"Those pallets are made to burn," he added.

Turner said he made a special call for a bulldozer from Contra Costa Fire to help overhaul the fire. There was no structural damage, but equipment stored in the yard, including storage containers, loaders and dump trucks, was damaged, he said.

Turner noted that there were lightning strikes reported in the area before the fire was called in, and that crews witnessed several more strikes while they were on the scene, but the cause is still being investigated.